Better Than Autodidacticism
by Mousme
Summary: Castiel finds everything about Dean fascinating... warnings & explanations in the notes


Title: **Better Than Autodidacticism**

Prompt/Summary: Prompted by the twisted-but-awesome mad_server at the comment-fic meme "Again, but with Colds." She wanted Cas with a sneeze kink and Dean with a bad cold. This is... not quite that, but close enough.

Characters: Castiel, Dean

Rating: R

Wordcount: 1,849

Disclaimer: So when Kripke stepped down I totally thought I had an in, except that they gave 'em to Sera. Blast.

Warnings: Not-quite-explicit m/m slash. Sex while sick as a dog. *hands*

Neurotic Author's Note #1: Uh, so, I don't exactly ship Dean/Cas, except apparently I sort of like writing it anyway. *headdesk* Apparently in my head Castiel finds _everything_ Dean does fascinating and compelling and... yeah. IDEK.

Neurotic Author's Note #2: That meme is doing terrible, terrible things to my brain. I can't even begin to explain this fic. /o\

* * *

"It is raining out," Cas observes.

"Whad's your poidt?" Dean is cross-legged on his bed, whetting the blades of his knife collection, all laid out carefully on oilcloths before him. A distant, unfocussed look flits over his features, and Cas can see his chest move as his breath hitches, ever so slightly. He puts down the knife, sneezes wetly into his cupped hands. "_HEHTZSHUH_!"

Cas shifts slightly where he is seated on the bed normally occupied by Sam. Sam who, in a sudden fit of overzealousness declared that he would be spending the entire day at the library, and who protested with a little too much conviction when Dean accused him of being a germophobe. On his way out, though, Sam had turned and grinned at Castiel and given him a thumbs-up while Dean was sneezing convulsively into a tissue. He still isn't sure what to make of Sam's actions, but it doesn't seem to take much of a stretch of the imagination to conclude that Sam was trying to give them some time alone together, if for no other reason than Sam is generally wont to stay close to Dean when he's ill, in order to make sure he's taken care of.

"I simply meant that it would be unwise for you to go out, as you clearly intend to do," he says in answer to Dean's question, noting with interest that his own vessel's pulse appears to be somewhat elevated. "Since you are ill," he clarifies, as though Dean might somehow have missed the fact that he has been nursing a terrible head cold for two days now.

Dean rolls his eyes, and Castiel watches his hands as he plucks a tissue from the box on the bedside table, long fingers crumpling the thin paper slightly before bringing it to his face and wiping at his nose. Dean's nose is one of the many things about him that is unique, Cas thinks, straight and tapered and entirely unlike Sam's, who resembles their father in that regard. Castiel has met their parents, and Dean's nose is entirely his own. The tip is red, now, irritated from the constant blowing. When he speaks his voice is thick with congestion, rough from where his throat is raw and sore, and the sound sends shivers all the way through Castiel's borrowed body. He watches Dean's eyelashes as they flutter against his cheeks, head tilted back, mouth slightly open, showing just a hint of white teeth. His lips are chapped from breathing through his mouth, from the mild fever he refuses to let Sam treat with Tylenol.

"_HHHTZCHHHT_!" Dean buries his face in the now thoroughly-sodden tissue, makes a face, and crumples it into a ball before tossing it in the general direction of the wastebasket. "Ugh. Loogk, Cas, I ged id. Bud we have rebaids to sald add burd, add Sab's goigg to bidch if I bake hib do id alode."

"I am sure Sam will not mind. He is concerned for your well-being," Castiel says mildly, hardly thinking about what he's saying. He finds himself oddly mesmerized by the sight of Dean sneezing, wondering exactly what it must feel like, to lose control in that brief and disconcerting way.

Dean catches him staring, and narrows his eyes. "Whad?" he croaks, coughs into his sleeve. "You wadt to tagke a pigture? It'll last logger. Hhh-_HASSZSHHZSHUH_! Ugh, God," he wipes his nose on the back of his wrist, leaving a shiny smear behind. "Gross," he mutters, reaches for another tissue. "Are you sdill sdarigg at be? Id's creepy, dude."

"My apologies," Castiel feels unaccountably warm, and tugs slightly at his collar. "I did not mean to make you uncomfortable." He's breathless for no reason he can determine, feels flushed under his clothes, watching Dean struggle with something so small and mundane, and not for the first time he wishes that human bodies weren't quite so predictable in their responses to pleasurable stimulation. He squirms a bit on his bed, places both hands on his knees.

"I'b dot udcobfortable," Dean's voice is muffled by the tissue. "Well, dot bore thad usual. Id's just... idtedse. Esbecially if you're dot pladdigg to put oud. I thought we were pasd all thad, adyway. Whad gives?"

"Nothing," Castiel says hastily, and then knows he has given himself away, at least a bit, because Dean's head snaps up, his expression searching. Then it turns into one with which Castiel is all too familiar.

"Cas," he smiles slowly, running a tongue over chapped lips. "You could have said sobethigg. I'b totally od board to sday idside, if thad's whad you had id mide..."

He panics a bit, heart thudding painfully against his ribs, because this is not at all what he had in mind. At least, not at first. But now he can't tear his gaze away from Dean's eyes, red-rimmed from the cold, pupils blown from the sudden onset of sexual interest. Dean is ill, he reminds himself. He should be resting, and nothing more, but Dean appears to have something entirely different planned, now. He abandons the knife collection, slides from the bed and onto Cas' lap in one smooth, lithe motion, like a cat, and slips a hand between Cas' legs, fondling him.

Castiel's breath catches in his throat, but he jerks involuntarily against Dean's hand. "We shouldn't—" he begins, but Dean catches his lower lip in his teeth.

"Cad you catch cold?" he asks, breaking away after a moment. "I dod't wadt to bake you sigk too."

He shakes his head. "I don't believe so."

"Good," Dean brushes their lips together again briefly, then pulls back, twists to the side, the back of his wrist pressed to his nose. "Hh-hhh-hh-_HASZSSHUH_! Sorry."

"There is no need to apologize," Cas murmurs, reaching up and tracing alongside Dean's nose with his fingers, marvelling at the difference between the soft skin there and the scrape of stubble along his chin. Dean twitches a bit.

"Hh— C-Cas, y-you're godda b-bake be— hhh!" he inhales sharply, pulls back, and scrubs two fingers under his nose, a habit he has even when he's not cold-ridden. "Dod't do thad. Whad?" he asks again, squinting at Castiel, who's breathing even harder than before, no longer bothering to hide his interest.

"What does it feel like?"

"Whad? Havig a cold?" Castiel nods, and Dean scrunches up his nose, at once perplexed and struggling with another sneeze. "I duddo... kide of crappy. By throat hurds add I cad't breathe add by dose is always idchy. I would't recobbed it. Why?" Cas keeps moving his fingers lightly over Dean's nose, and is rewarded with a delicate quivering of nostrils, a hitch of breath. "C-Cas..."

He shifts until their faces are a fraction of an inch apart, his lips hovering near Dean's chin, feeling the short, hot puffs of Dean's breath against his skin. He can sense the tension in Dean's body, muscles clenched, slow arousal mixed with something more urgent, desperate. "Tell me what it feels like."

"I-id's a bid k-kigky, eved... hh... eved for us, dod't you thigk?" Dean tries to pull back, but Cas snakes an arm around his waist, keeps him in place, smooths his free hand over his too-warm forehead, and presses a kiss to his jaw, letting his teeth scrape lightly there the way he knows Dean likes, and he feels him relent with a small moan of contentment, followed by another hitching inhale. "I c-cad't exblaid id... id jusd... id feels ligke... hh... ligke feathers. By dose geds all, uh, t-tigkly add... hhh!" he makes another attempt to pull away. "C-Cas, s-dop... I'b godda..."

Cas moves his fingers to press under Dean's nose, senses his breathing slow to a slightly less desperate rate. "Does that help?" he asks softly, and Dean nods.

"A-A bid. Sdill deed to sdeeze, though..." Dean blinks blearily at him. "You're a kigky sud of a bidch, you kdow thad?" he laughs suddenly, and sets about peeling away Castiel's shirt, pulling the tie loose, sniffling against the back of his wrist. "Dabb. By dose is so dabbed tigkly..."

Castiel, who has been doing his best to reciprocate Dean's attempts at undressing him, pauses in his work to look up at Dean's face, and feels a renewed surge of unexpected warmth, which doesn't go unnoticed. Dean tosses his shirt to the floor, pushes him backward onto the bed.

"You ligke thad, huh?" he sniffles again. "Ligke hearigg be talk? You always did ligke by voice. Hh-hhh- _HHHTZSCHSHH_! Uh," he groans behind the hand he just sneezed into, keeps sniffling, and gropes blindly for the box of tissues, until Castiel stops him with a hand on his wrist.

"Let me," he plucks a few tissues from the box, better-equipped than Dean, whose eyes are streaming, and uses one to wipe gently at his nose. "Does it hurt?"

"Sdeezigg? Doh," Dean shakes his head. "Feels kide of dice, agtually... uh... baybe y-you sh-should't," his eyelashes flutter as Castiel keeps stroking his nose lightly with the tissue. "Hh-_HZSHSHHUH_!" his head snaps forward, and Castiel feels the fine mist settle lightly on his overheated skin.

It shouldn't feel as good as it does, and his hips buck involuntarily. Dean sneezes again, and when his breath hitches in anticipation of a third sneeze, Castiel presses the tissue against his nose and mouth, enjoying the feeling of Dean convulsing helplessly into his hand. Moisture seeps against his palm, and he finds that he doesn't mind at all, just grinds his hips up, feeling his erection rub against Dean's through the fabric of their trousers. It's somehow more arousing than anything they've ever done before, watching Dean laid open, bare and vulnerable, letting him hold him together in a way he never has.

Dean opens his eyes once the sneezing fit has passed, and smiles sheepishly, rolling his hips in time with Castiel's motions, seemingly unconcerned by the fact that they're both still half-clothed. "You're preddy weird, you kdow that?"

"So you've said."

"This doesd't gross you oud?"

"Should it?"

"I duddo. Baybe?" Dean turns his head to the side to cough.

Castiel pulls him closer, nudges his tongue past Dean's lips. His mouth tastes faintly of the cherry cold syrup that he took earlier. "You are always desirable," he mumbles against his mouth. "I find everything about you fascinating..."

"Igcludigg by sdeezigg, apparedtly."

"I want to know everything there is to know about you," he says, unsure how else to explain himself. "More than the superficial knowledge I currently possess."

"Id thad case," Dean nips at his jaw, and slides a hand under the waistband of Castiel's trousers to grip his erection lightly in callused fingers. "I ab happy to codtribute to your codtiduing edugatiod..."


End file.
